Medicine students launch International Health Seminar Series

Medicine students at The University of Notre Dame Australia’s Sydney Campus have launched an International Health Seminar Series - featuring prominent guest speakers in the industry. The most recent talk, Maternal and Infant Health, was given by Australian trained obstetrician gynecologist, Dr Andrew Browning, who has been working in Ethiopia since 2001 with the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital. Dr Browning also travels throughout Africa and South East Asia teaching surgical teams how to care for women with obstetric fistula. Over 100 medical and nursing students came to hear Dr Browning speak about the health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) set out by the global community. These goals focus on improving the health of pregnant women and young children globally - especially in third world and developing countries. “As the MDG target date of 2015 draws nearer it appears that most poor countries will not fulfil these goals, as child and maternal mortality figures have shown little to no improvement. There are, however, country case studies of success, where simple but effective measures have been implemented. The international community could learn from these,” said Dr Browning. International Health student representative, Ms Laura Collie, said the program was started to give students the opportunity to cover areas of health that are prevalent on a global basis. “This seminar series will help the medicine and nursing students of Notre Dame to be better informed and better equipped to deal with these global health issues and diseases when they encounter them,” said Ms Collie. Many other International Health areas will be covered throughout the series, such as; Malaria and Tropical Diseases, HIV/AIDS, Refugee Health and Health and Humanitarian Crisis. At the end of the series students who have attended will receive a Certificate in International Health from the School of Medicine. Media contact: Moira Saunders 02 8204 440